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Today's Topics:

1. Re: Bill O'Reilly: Now It's Time to Boycott....Canada
(snitilicious@tampabay.rr.com)
2. in Geras' black and white world, is this guy a terrorist?
(Stephen E Philion)
3. Fw: Happy May Day from AK Press (marc rodrigues)
4. Iraqis Offer Bounty for US Officials (Yoshie Furuhashi)
5. cuffing granny (Doug Henwood)
6. cuffing granny (Stephen E Philion)
7. Re: Bill O'Reilly: Now It's Time to Boycott....Canada
(jeffrey fisher)
8. Re: Talk Left, Walk Right (Grant Lee)
9. "Museum piece" choppers bought by Australia (Grant Lee)

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 19:44:57 -0400
From: snitilicious@tampabay.rr.com
Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Bill O'Reilly: Now It's Time to
Boycott....Canada
To: lbo-talk@lbo-talk.org
Message-ID:
<6.0.2.0.2.20040428194430.034d5ba0@pop-server.tampabay.rr.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed

At 07:34 PM 4/28/2004, Doug Henwood wrote:
>Travis Fast wrote:
>
>>All depends, the bourgeoisie in Canada did quite well for themselves with
>>the nation building rhetoric of the late 19th century. As for me I would
>>like to use Canadian nationalism towards promoting a truly perverse
>>dependency on the US. We would become a self actualized nation of self
>>organizing freaks which, with open arms, welcomes all cultural refugees
>>from the US. If you American lefties would just give up on your manifest
>>destiny and come north (4,000,000 would do the electoral trick) we could
>>get started today.
>
>Got jobs? Work permits?
>
>Doug

I'm there in a heartbeat!

Kelley

------------------------------

Message: 2
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 18:51:41 -0500
From: Stephen E Philion <philion@hawaii.edu>
Subject: [lbo-talk] in Geras' black and white world, is this guy a
terrorist?
To: lbo-talk@lbo-talk.org
Message-ID: <1e829751e844a5.1e844a51e82975@hawaii.edu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

The US destroyed imperial Japan and intentionally blew up hundreds of
thousands (millions?) of civilians, and yet managed carry out a
stunningly successful occupation.

--uhm, well yeah, after they blew up millions of civilians...they had
pretty much taken care of the problem of resistance. In Iraq, of
course, the US hasn't obliterated the country to the point of bringing
the populace to their knees. Now the US is trying to bring the country
to its knees, so it can then liberate them. This is just all part of
being a democratic country trying to do the right thing.
------------------------------------
A much less brutal war in Iraq against a tyrant with little popular
support has (as everyone knows) given way to a chaotic, largely
unsuccesful occupation.

--more important, the Iraqi population has never been sold on the idea
that it was necessary to invade the country to deal with their problem
of Sodom. Now we have to make them see things our way by force, even
torture if necessary..so we can liberate them and privatize their
assets.

steve

------------------------------

Message: 3
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 19:10:21 -0500
From: "marc rodrigues" <marc36@graffiti.net>
Subject: [lbo-talk] Fw: Happy May Day from AK Press
To: labor21k@flag.blackened.net, lbo-talk@lbo-talk.org,
QCUnionSemester@yahoogroups.com
Message-ID: <20040429001021.8C1AB23AB5@ws5-3.us4.outblaze.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1"

----- Original Message -----
From: Lani Riccobuono <lani@akpress.org>
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 15:33:53 -0700
To: lani <lani@akpress.org>
Subject: Happy May Day from AK Press

> "It may surprise some of our American citizens to learn that in this country
> of 'free speech' there is no easier thing in the world than to sentence
> persons to death for expressing their views." --August Spies
>
> Hey Folks,
>
> Everyone here at AK Press wishes you a happy May Day! We also wish that more
> people in this country knew what International Workers' Day is all about.
> The United States is one of the few nations that doesn't recognize the
> holiday. Which is pretty weird considering that it was here that organized
> labor first passed a resolution that "eight hours shall constitute a legal
> day's work, from and after May 1, 1886." It was here that hundreds of
> thousands of workers went on strike to win that eight-hour day. It was here,
> in Chicago, that their victory was christened with the blood of the
> Haymarket martyrs.
>
> It's also here that the government has organized a long campaign of enforced
> amnesia about the true meaning of the day. In 1894, President Cleveland
> tried to bury the history of class struggle by declaring the first Monday in
> September to be "Labor Day," a tame, patriotic version of the real thing. In
> 1958, Eisenhower added insult to injury by making May 1st "Law Day"--a
> twisted irony considering the hand-picked jury and biased judge that
> condemned innocent men to death in Chicago.
>
> For a very readable history lesson, check out this page from the Struggle
> collection: http://www.struggle.ws/about/mayday.html.
>
> For a broader perspective, head to
> http://slash.autonomedia.org/article.pl?sid=02/05/02/1029240 for Peter
> Linebaugh's "The Incomplete, True, Authentic and Wonderful History of May
> Day" (also in AK Press' forthcoming book, SERPENTS IN THE GARDEN: LIASONS
> WITH CULTURE & SEX, edited by Alexander Cockburn & Jeffrey St. Clair--see
> below for more info).
>
> Also check out your local Indymedia site for May Day Events in your area.
> Workers of the World, rock on!
>
> **NEW & UPCOMING FROM AK**
>
> Speaking of books from AK Press, we've been damn busy the last few months.
> Here's what's hot off the press:
>
> For anyone who wants to know what nasty bits are lurking in their food,
> there's ANIMAL INGREDIENTS FROM A TO Z (Third Edition), the E.G. Smith
> Collective's bible for vegetarians, vegans, the health conscious and caring
> consumers. It's a comprehensive listing of animal ingredients that's easy to
> navigate with supplemental information on vegan nutrition, food alternatives
> and contact information for animal advocacy groups.
> http://www.akpress.org/dosearch.php?itemid=4404
>
> The Biotic Baking Brigade's recipe for the public humiliation of public
> officials, PIE ANY MEANS NECESSARY, outlines the fine art of landing a
> freshly-baked delicacy in the face of the reactionary, pompous and otherwise
> deserving. An intoxicating melange of history, analysis, tactics and recipes
> for this most edible of the political direct action techniques!
> http://www.akpress.org/dosearch.php?itemid=4405
>
> Author Katya Komisaruk, perhaps the only person admitted to Harvard Law
> School while serving a five-year prison sentence, serves up BEAT THE HEAT:
> HOW TO HANDLE ENCOUNTERS WITH LAW ENFORCEMENT. Covering everything from how
> to read a search warrant to what to tell a judge to get your sentence
> reduced, this amazing book is like getting a one-on-one coaching session
> with your lawyerŠso you can learn what to do before trouble's at your door.
> http://www.akpress.org/dosearch.php?itemid=4388
>
> Easily the greatest of hobo biographies, Jim Tully's BEGGARS OF LIFE takes
> us across the seamy underbelly of pre-WW1 America on freight trains, and
> inside hobo jungles and brothels, while narrowly avoiding railroad bulls and
> the wardens of order. "He writes keenly of what he has observed keenly, and
> his descriptions of long night rides on mail trains and the death of
> 'Oklahoma Red' are little short of fascinating." [New York Times]
> http://www.akpress.org/dosearch.php?itemid=4389
>
> Due out in the next few months:
>
> LANGUAGE AND POLITICS, Noam Chomsky
> An enormous chronological collection of over fifty interviews conducted with
> Chomsky from 1968 to the present.
>
> SERPENTS IN THE GARDEN: LIASONS WITH CULTURE & SEX, Alexander Cockburn &
> Jeffrey St. Clair
> The latest in the award-winning Counterpunch series. An explosion of
> voracious, opinionated and witty fireworks on the unexpected intersections
> of politics, art, music, architecture and sex.
>
> ANARCHO-SYNDICALISM, Rudolph Rocker
> The greatest introduction to Anarchism and anarchist practice ever penned,
> by one of its leading theoreticians.
>
> OUT OF THE NIGHT, Jan Valtin
> From double agent in the Nazis' Gestapo to Communist Party official,
> Valtin's spellbinding autobiography gives an unflinching portrayal of the
> internal machinations of both parties.
>
> FREE WOMEN OF SPAIN, Martha Ackelsberg
> A comprehensive study of the Spanish Revolution's Mujeres Libres that
> intertwines interviews with the women themselves and analysis connecting
> them to modern feminist movements.
>
> THE VOLTAIRINE DE CLEYRE READER
> An indispensable, fully annotated collection of the works of this leading
> intellectual, activist, speaker and writer who had a tremendous impact on
> the American anarchist, feminist and labor movements.
>
> AT WAR WITH ASIA, Noam Chomsky
> A reprint of Chomsky's classic guide to understanding both the past and
> current logic of imperial force. More relevant than ever!
>
>
> **FRIENDS OF AK**
>
> All that publishing, besides making eight-hour days pretty uncommon here at
> AK, costs a lot of money. We've put out around 20 books in the past year and
> hope to do even more in the next 12 months. Friends of AK Press is a way you
> can directly help us realize these and many more such projects. Friends
> agree to pay a minimum of $20 per month into our AK Press account (of
> course, we have no objection to larger sums). All money received goes
> directly into our publishing projects.
>
> As a Friend you would not only help keep the presses rolling here at AK but
> for the duration of your membership you'll receive, as they appear, one free
> copy of every AK Press title complete with free shipping. That can mean
> hundreds of dollars' worth of great books, DVDs and CDs shipped for FREE to
> each Friend of AK. And to sweeten the deal even more, Friends of AK are
> also entitled to a 10% discount on each and every order of any item we
> publish or distribute for the duration of their membership.
>
> To become a Friend of AK Press today go to our website:
> http://www.akpress.org/friends_bottom.php.
>
> **AK WEBSITE**
>
> Get ready. Our website will be getting a major overhaul this summer, with
> better searches, easier navigation and new features. In the meantime,
> www.akpress.org is still the place to go for the most up-to-date news about
> what we're doing, our newest items, and much more. Check us out for May Day
> stuff like:
>
> Haymarket T-shirt
> Wear your politics on your, uh, chestŠand let people know what this day is
> really about.
> http://www.akpress.org/dosearch.php?itemid=3854
>
> Anarcho-Syndicalist Flag
> The classic version, in all its black & red glory.
> http://www.akpress.org/dosearch.php?itemid=1205
>
> AK Shoulder Bag
> US made sweat-free luxury 'shoulder' bag. Or a poor person's bicycle courier
> bag. Room for a few hundred flyers and an entire May Day picnic.
> http://www.akpress.org/dosearch.php?itemid=4397
>
> While you're at it, click on the AK Bookmobile link
> (http://www.akpress.org/bookmobile_bottom.php) to find out when we, or our
> distant comrades, will be tabling in your part of the world. If you live in
> the bay area, it's also the place to find a list of all the music, film and
> book-related events happening in the AK warehouse here in Oakland. Stop by
> and meet us in the flesh!
>
> Thanks for your support,
>
> The AK Press Collective
>

--
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------------------------------

Message: 4
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 20:46:22 -0400
From: Yoshie Furuhashi <furuhashi.1@osu.edu>
Subject: [lbo-talk] Iraqis Offer Bounty for US Officials
To: lbo-talk@lbo-talk.org, furuhashi.1@osu.edu
Message-ID: <p0510033cbcb5ff0229c4@[140.254.113.180]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed

"Iraqis Offer Bounty for US Officials":
<http://montages.blogspot.com/2004_04_01_montages_archive.html#108319912301633438>.
--
Yoshie

* Critical Montages: <http://montages.blogspot.com/>
* Bring Them Home Now! <http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/>
* Calendars of Events in Columbus:
<http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/calendar.html>,
<http://www.freepress.org/calendar.php>, & <http://www.cpanews.org/>
* Student International Forum: <http://sif.org.ohio-state.edu/>
* Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osudivest.org/>
* Al-Awda-Ohio: <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Al-Awda-Ohio>
* Solidarity: <http://www.solidarity-us.org/>

------------------------------

Message: 5
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 20:49:47 -0400
From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood@panix.com>
Subject: [lbo-talk] cuffing granny
To: lbo-talk <lbo-talk@lbo-talk.org>
Message-ID: <p05200f01bcb6017e7b1b@[192.168.1.100]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed"

[via Sam Smith's Progressive Review <http://prorev.com>]

POST CONSTITUTIONAL AMERICA
http://www.local6.com/news/3245574/detail.html

CHANNEL 6, HIGHLAND PARK, Texas - Police in the Dallas suburb of
Highland Park handcuffed a 97-year-old woman and hauled her to jail
in a squad car last week for having an expired registration sticker.

Police said they have a no-exceptions policy. Everyone gets treated
the same -- arrested, handcuffed, and taken to jail -- even on minor
traffic warrants. Dolly Kelton was driving herself to the beauty shop
when she noticed the flashing red lights in her rearview mirror.
Kelton was arrested after she neglected to pay a previous ticket for
the same expired sticker. "I just overlooked it, which I never should
have done," Kelton said. . .

Police booked her into jail like any other criminal, Kelton said.
"They fingerprinted me and took all these pictures of me," she said.
She was in police custody for about two hours before her attorney
arrived and she was released on her own recognizance.

------------------------------

Message: 6
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 20:08:17 -0500
From: Stephen E Philion <philion@hawaii.edu>
Subject: [lbo-talk] cuffing granny
To: lbo-talk@lbo-talk.org
Message-ID: <1edcb9b1ed5d0a.1ed5d0a1edcb9b@hawaii.edu>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii

i apologise for committing the mortal sin of overposting, but since i
haven't done so in weeks, i can get a special dispensation or some such
break.
Hey doug, how do you know that granny couldn't have been an evildoer?
or a terrorist evildoer? or a sodom holdout?

steve

------------------------------

Message: 7
Date: Wed, 28 Apr 2004 21:17:19 -0400
From: jeffrey fisher <jfisher@igc.org>
Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Bill O'Reilly: Now It's Time to
Boycott....Canada
To: lbo-talk@lbo-talk.org
Message-ID: <F5908E3E-997A-11D8-BBE9-000393576462@igc.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed

On Wednesday, April 28, 2004, at 07:44 PM, snitilicious@tampabay.rr.com
wrote:

> At 07:34 PM 4/28/2004, Doug Henwood wrote:
>> Travis Fast wrote:
>>
>>> All depends, the bourgeoisie in Canada did quite well for themselves
>>> with the nation building rhetoric of the late 19th century. As for
>>> me I would like to use Canadian nationalism towards promoting a
>>> truly perverse dependency on the US. We would become a self
>>> actualized nation of self organizing freaks which, with open arms,
>>> welcomes all cultural refugees from the US. If you American lefties
>>> would just give up on your manifest destiny and come north
>>> (4,000,000 would do the electoral trick) we could get started today.
>>
>> Got jobs? Work permits?
>>
>> Doug
>
>
> I'm there in a heartbeat!

likewise. bc?

j

------------------------------

Message: 8
Date: Thu, 29 Apr 2004 09:24:03 +0800
From: "Grant Lee" <grantlee@iinet.net.au>
Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Talk Left, Walk Right
To: <lbo-talk@lbo-talk.org>
Message-ID: <005101c42d88$a955ef40$9ec43bcb@01955102>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

Yoshie:

> "Overcoming the concept of 'progress' and overcoming the concept of
> 'period of decline' are two sides of one and the same thing." --
> Walter Benjamin, <a
> href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog/BENARC.html ">The Arcades
> Project,</a> trans. Howard Eiland and Kevin McLaughlin, Cambridge, MA
> and London, England: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press,
> 1999, p. 460.

Sorry, but I have no real idea how Benjamin is relevant to the neoliberal v.
conservative issue.

Grant.

------------------------------

Message: 9
Date: Thu, 29 Apr 2004 09:27:53 +0800
From: "Grant Lee" <grantlee@iinet.net.au>
Subject: [lbo-talk] "Museum piece" choppers bought by Australia
To: "lbo-talk" <lbo-talk@lbo-talk.org>
Message-ID: <005601c42d89$31c9e160$9ec43bcb@01955102>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"

[US$1bn for 11 choppers, some of which are Vietnam veterans...even better
than the recent decision to buy 2nd-hand M-1 tanks.]

April 28, 2004

Seasprite - The Billion Dollar Blunder

Australia's prominent role in the war on terror has led to calls for
increased spending on defence. But tonight's story - on how Australia forked
out over $1 billion for helicopters which are literally museum pieces -
raises serious questions about how the defence budget is being managed. Thom
Cookes has more.

REPORTER: Thom Cookes
This scout troop is on an outing to a naval museum just outside of
Washington DC. A retired marine sergeant is giving them a guided tour of one
of the museum's prize exhibits.
MARINE SERGEANT: Now we'll tell you a little bit about the Seasprite here.
This particular bird is a sub-hunter. This thing had a great history in its
flight time, and it was retired here to the museum.
[REPORTER:] The Seasprite naval helicopter, first flown in the 1950s, is now
a
museum piece in the United States. It was phased out of service from the
early '90s and by 2001 the US had put its few remaining Seasprites into
storage. But remarkably, the Royal Australian Navy has spent over $1 billion
on these museum pieces. It bought 11 of the ageing helicopters and has spent
the last seven years trying to convert them into state-of-the-art war
machines. Most are older than the Seasprite on display in the US and some
even flew in the Vietnam War.
The Australian Defence Department has a long history of embarrassing
blunders on major projects, but the story of the Seasprite helicopter is
possibly the most shocking to emerge so far.

* * * *

Aldo Borgu is a former adviser to three coalition defence ministers and is
now an analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. He explains how
the Seasprite project came about.
ALDO BORGU: Certainly the major requirement was because we actually had a
smaller ship, the offshore patrol combatant, or offshore patrol vessel,
which we were basically putting together jointly with Malaysia, it couldn't
carry a Seahawk helicopter, which can be carried on the Anzac frigate, so if
we were proceeding just with the Anzacs, we probably would have gone for the
existing Seahawk helicopter, but because we also had this smaller ship,
which was banking on the fact that the Malaysians would buy it so we'd have
a joint development program, we needed a smaller size helicopter which would
have been either the Seasprite or the Westland Lynx.
[REPORTER:] Being small was the one thing the Seasprite had going for it.
This is the
offshore patrol vessel designed for the joint Malaysian-Australian project.
The size of this rear helicopter deck meant that Australia's existing
Seahawk helicopters would be too large to land on the ship. Under
questioning in Senate Estimates hearings, defence officials admitted that
this was the sole reason the Seasprite was bought.

* * * *

REPORTER: Why do you think the Defence Department went ahead with the
Seasprite even though the offshore patrol vessel was cancelled?
SENATOR CHRIS EVANS: Look, it's a complete mystery to me. There's been no
proper explanation of that. The helicopter was designed for a ship that was
cancelled, but we went ahead and ordered the helicopter, even though the
capability was no longer going to be purchased.
The Defence Department was unable to provide anyone for an interview with
Dateline, but it's previously claimed that once it had signed the Seasprite
contract, there was no going back.

* * * *

ALDO BORGU: Once we decided we don't need the offshore patrol vessel
anymore, we should have decided we don't need the Seasprite anymore and just
gone with a far more simpler solution in terms of getting additional Seahawk
helicopters. There is this point about once a project gets approved,
certainly by Cabinet, let alone moving into the acquisition phase, I don't
think Defence naturally doesn't want to walk away from it, bird in the hand
worth two in the bush type scenario, but the problem is that's irrespective
of how many problems it actually comes up against. I've never met a project
that Defence didn't like.
[REPORTER:]Undeterred by no longer having the ship it was designed for
Defence went
ahead with the Seasprite and was given two options by the manufacturer,
Kaman Aerospace. Kaman could either restart its production line and build
totally new helicopters or it could hunt around for old Seasprites that had
been retired and rebuild them. Defence chose this cheaper second option. But
as Opposition Defence Spokesman Chris Evans discovered, these old airframes
were not entirely up to scratch.
SENATOR CHRIS EVANS: The contractor, in order to meet your specifications,
has decided that some of these frames, up to 70%, has to be replaced - is
that fair?

* * * *

SENATOR CHRIS EVANS: Okay. What sorts of hours would these airframes already
have flown? Did any of them serve in the Vietnam War, by the way? Did any of
them fly in the Vietnam War?
AIR VICE MARSHALL CONROY: From their build dates, it would appear so.
In fact, according to Defence, some of the Seasprite air frames date back to
1963 and have already been rebuilt at least twice.
AIR VICE MARSHALL CONROY: The air frames themselves were stored at a US
storage facility and the Commonwealth sent a team of experts, engineering
experts, to pick those air frames that were in the best condition.

[REPORTER:] AMARC, or the Aircraft Maintenance and Regeneration Centre, is a
massive
parking lot where the US keeps aircraft it no longer has any use for. There
are almost 4,500 planes and helicopters stored out here in the Arizona
desert. It's hard to find a more graphic display of military might and the
amount of money that the US is prepared to spend on defence. These B1-B
nuclear bombers were virtually redundant from the first day they were flown.
They cost around US$300 million a piece and there are 18 of them in
mothballs here.
LARRY KOTZ: I don't think I want to know how much those things are worth out
there. As a taxpayer, I just don't want to know.
Larry Kotz has an office on the edge of AMARC and makes a living buying up
old military aircraft for either parts or scrap. He's currently working over
these C-141 transport jets.

* * * *

[REPORTER:] Dateline has established from US Defence Department records that
when these
choppers were put into storage, they were each valued at around $600,000
American. By the time the Australian project is finished, we'll have
effectively spent around $100 million getting each one of our 11 Seasprites
into the air.
It may be a $1 billion project for Australia, but US records show that since
the early '90s the United States has been trying to give away its old
Seasprites as part of military aid packages. Despite the fact that the
Americans were offering free helicopters, in at least three cases they were
knocked back - Greece in 1993, Turkey in 1994 and Thailand in 1997.
REPORTER: Did you know that the United States has been trying to give away
the Seasprite to a number of countries?
SENATOR CHRIS EVANS: No, I didn't know that. I suppose it shouldn't surprise
me. But this is just the final nail, I suppose, in the coffin of the story.
[REPORTER:] But Defence sources claim that the most serious blunder with the
Seasprite
are the sophisticated electronics and weapons that Australia has tried to
cram into a 1950s design. Australia's Seasprites are being fitted with
advanced systems that allow the helicopter to be flown by a crew of two
instead of three and to find and destroy targets without the help of a
mothership.

* * * *

ALDO BORGU: Every time you try to put advanced avionics and systems into an
old platform, you run into problems. Every time you try to integrate new
weapons onto an old platform, you are going to run into problems. Before you
actually try to commit billions of dollars or hundreds of millions of
dollars to these projects, have a good sense about how realistic it is, what
you're trying to actually achieve.
[REPORTER:] Dateline has spoken to several US Defence sources who were
stunned by the
complexity of the systems Australia planned for the Seasprite. As far as
Larry Kotz is concerned, it would have been better to keep it simple.
LARRY KOTZ: That wasn't done in Australia's case. They bought the whole, you
know, kitchen with the sink and the automatic dishwasher and the
refrigerator/freezer and they put it all in and they've had some growing
pains. Now, my understanding is they're on track with getting that done and
by the time they're done, they're going to have a very cool system. It's
going to be able to track eight targets at the same time and do all kinds of
nifty things. Whether that was a good way to go in the very beginning or to
have done it slowly, it's kind of too late to worry about it now since it's
already a done issue. If I was going to do it, I would have made a more
simpler package closer to what the New Zealanders did.
[REPORTER:] The NZ Navy bought four old Seasprites for training and parts
and then a
further five brand-new choppers. These new Seasprites were bought virtually
off the shelf and use a missile system already tested by the US and have
been in operation for the last three years. For its nine Seasprites, the NZ
Navy spent around $290 million compared to the $1.1 billion Australia will
spend on 11.

* * * *

NAVY OFFICER: The super Seasprite project has attracted its fair share of
negative publicity and, yes, it is 3.5 years late, whilst remaining within
budget. The delay has come about by the usual challenges faced by projects
introducing leading-edge technology. The Defence Material Organisation has
learned several important lessons from the progress of this program, which
we've heeded.
[REPORTER:] One of those lessons was how to write a contract. When Defence
agreed to buy
the Seasprite, it also paid for a 10-year maintenance contract. But it
forgot to link the two and as the project lagged further and further behind,
Defence faced a $30 million maintenance bill for helicopters that are yet to
arrive.
REPORTER: Did you find that shocking, though, that you can be paying for a
maintenance contract and not actually have the helicopter present and that
there's no linkage in time between the two?
ALDO BORGU: It's ridiculous. I don't think anybody can basically argue
against that.

http://www.sbs.com.au/dateline/#

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